Do you know what you’re interested in? Or are you still exploring your options? With the number of changes that this year has brought upon us, the answers to these questions might not be as certain as we’d like. Not to worry – the Greene Center is here to help you! Here are 5 virtual resources to help you explore your interests.
CareerExplorer (Sokanu)
If you’re like me when I was a first-year, you have absolutely no idea what you’re interested in and you don’t know where to even start looking. No worries! CareerExplorer, (formerly known as Sokanu) is a great career aptitude questionnaire that can provide you with professions to explore based on your interests and personality. The form takes about 30-40 minutes to complete, but trust me, it’s worth your time. Not only will you get a list of personalized career options you can click on and explore, but you’ll also get personality and trait reports. These reports summarize your responses and give you general information about what kinds of professions might interest you. They also give you tips to look out for and ways you can be successful, no matter what you do. Take the assessment!
Vault
Vault provides insider information including tools and methods for career and industry research and exploration. It also provides key employers in a variety of industries. Vault allows you to explore so many things including companies within an industry, job and internship opportunities, and career advice. One of my favorite features of Vault is their ‘Vault Guides’. These guides have the most important information consolidated in one place, and are great for quick reference. The guides have general information about typical salary range, schooling required, and even career ladders. They also include more specific information on work environments, tips for entering the industry, and important industry contact resources for more information. These guides are a must read for anyone interested in…well, pretty much anything!
With your Handshake account, you can log into Vault’s premium information by clicking on the “Create my Vault Account” button. Check out Vault here!
Meliora Collective
Talking to people can be one of the best ways to explore your interests. Although networking can be challenging sometimes, the Meliora Collective makes it easy to search, find, and connect with alumni and affiliates from the U of R. The Collective provides curated profiles based on your frequent searches and your baseline answers to the set-up questionnaire. The more you use it, the better it will be at providing contact information of people you might want to talk to!
Once you’ve created an account and logged in, the “Connections” tab is where you can find and begin to connect with current undergraduate and graduate students, alumni, faculty, and staff who are all associated with the University of Rochester. Additionally, once you’ve found someone you want to connect with, you can click on the green “Message” button and three prewritten templates are available for you to choose from! These templates are a great way to get started with networking. You can even modify them to fit your needs. The Collective also has a Mentorship Program, Discussion Boards, and various Groups you can join to enhance your network and career readiness. Log into the Meliora Collective now!
CareerShift
CareerShift is another resource you can access through the resources link on Handshake. On CareerShift you can search for jobs and internships, companies, and contact information. This is a great resource to use when exploring different industries. With CareerShift you can create ‘Campaigns’ in which you can consolidate information from a certain company, industry or group of people you want to contact. This is a great way to find people to network and have informational interviews with. Check out our information on networking if you need help getting started.
The reason that CareerShift should be one of your top resources is because they have so much information about almost any industry or company you can think of. Additionally, their resources for a certain search can be saved in neat folders you can access later, which makes it very easy to get started! Check out CareerShift here!
Careers Unfiltered
Careers Unfiltered is the Greene Center’s very own podcast! The show is hosted by Danae King, the Communications and Marketing Manager for the Greene Center, and Casey Ryu, a Senior at U of R. Join them as they talk about various career related topics with Alumni from the University and special guests from across the country. These podcast episodes range from 20 minutes to an hour of unfiltered experiences and advice from so many different perspectives. Take a listen!
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Those are the top 5 virtual resources to help you explore your career interests this summer. If you have any questions about these resources, feel free to connect with us!
